


I've got so many things in my hungry heart

by trashmctrash



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Character Study, Gen, M/M, the tags are for all the chapter so yall know, theyre tagged in order of appearance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-24
Updated: 2021-02-11
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:54:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24358411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trashmctrash/pseuds/trashmctrash
Summary: Peter recalls the past (where did it go wrong, was it ever right?) and the people in it (most of which he wish weren't apart of his life).
Relationships: Elias Bouchard/Peter Lukas, Martin Blackwood & Peter Lukas, Peter Lukas/Jonah Magnus, Simon Fairchild & Peter Lukas
Comments: 6
Kudos: 33





	1. Peter

**Author's Note:**

> now you may ask yourself, is that another title taken from the Crane Wives? and you'd be right, it's from one of their singles "High Horse".  
> another question may be: why are you writing about Peter Lukas so much? And the answer to that one would be somewhere between "I started this right after MAG 159 aired" and "I'm in love with him and his character is very interesting to me".
> 
> And yes. This will be very short. I'm imagining somewhere around 2k when I'm done (oops I lied)

Peter Lukas cannot remember the first time he was Lonely. Maybe it was when he was 5, when his parents took all his siblings and left him alone in the house. Maybe the power first touched him then, as he wandered the empty halls of a cold, silent, sprawling mansion, too timid to cry out for an answer that he knew would not come. Maybe it was before that, when he realized that his parents did not love him, did not love anything or anyone. Maybe it happened later, as a teen, when he accepted that he was exactly like them. Hungry and yearning and empty inside. 

He relished in the power of seeing someone disappear before his eyes, of finally having control of the people around him. The fear in that ~~innocent~~ annoying man’s eyes before he disappeared was thrilling. Peter knew, somehow, even at the beginning of his god’s gifts, that the place he was going to was quiet and lonely. He almost envied the poor bastard. 

(He used to think the money was left out because his mother wanted to chase him out. Then he stopped thinking that when he was led below their house, into a catacomb that he never knew was there. And then, much later in life, Peter realized he was never wrong in the first place.)

He remembers clearly when he learned what his family name meant. A life of isolation and bitter neglect. All waved away with the explanation that it was to make him stronger, make him better, more suitable for their god. How Peter relished it, finally understanding why his parents were so cold and distant. They did not hate him, they just simply felt nothing for him, and in that moment he, too, felt nothing at all, as the emptiness of serving the Forsaken filled him. 

One by one, his family left. Three sisters and one brother, all left because they could not find comfort in their isolation. They’ve all abandoned him. Did not even think to take him with them when they fled. Do they ever think of him? Peter hopes they don’t, for all they may deserve, this is not one. His mother is silent as always, his father’s absence is different than that of his siblings. 

Peter stepped into the fog. What else could he do?

He takes to the seas, sailing on the _Tundra_. It's still under his family’s name of course, but he can almost trick himself into believing that he chose the Forsaken by himself. The ship heads to port less and less, it’s not like they’re actually shipping anything. Peter doesn’t like the feeling of being watched when they head to shore, eyes on him even when there’s no one there. He had chosen the right crew, they don’t utter a word of complaint when he calls them out on a starless night for a send off. Not even when it becomes a grim routine. The _joy_ he feels over the torment of his crew and the cloying desperation of the people fed to his god almost makes up for the bitter taste in his mouth when he sees a rolling fog. Peter likes this, he _has_ to like this. 

(He finally believes that much, much, much later.)


	2. Simon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> i love simon fairchild, king of not giving a fuck

Simon Fairchild had apparently clung to the side of the ship for three days before a sailor running maintenance saw him. She called for another’s assistance to pull the old man up before suffering an intense bout of vertigo and tipping over the side herself. Peter had walked out of his quarters, somewhat upset with being called outside during the day, to see a grinning old man on the deck of his boat. They never found that sailor. Peter wasn’t too bothered by that.

(Peter recalls Simon and his first meeting quite fondly, really, every meeting with Simon, their rarity made them enjoyable even to a man whose entire identity was based on being alone and sullen.)

It was odd to see a stowaway aboard the _Tundra_ seeing as how they were a few weeks into a voyage and in the middle of the Pacific. Just like how it was odd when Simon stepped right through Peter’s fog to clap his hand on Peter’s shoulder, breezing right past him while asking cheerily what dinner is looking like. 

(It was the middle of the day…..)

Of course Peter knew something was up with this little old man, if nothing he could recognize the power and emptiness that hid behind the man’s sky blue eyes. The feeling of vertigo as he smiled, the smell of ozone. 

Simon was the one to tell Peter about all the powers at play in the world, that there were other gods in their twisted pantheon. Beings, concepts, gods or devils that exist outside the human comprehension, using their infinite power to shape the world they exist outside of, using people like Simon or himself. Peter was a part of a collective, he hated it. He wanted to know more.

(Not that he was much interested in other patrons, not when he was born and raised to worship the Forsaken.)

When Simon finishes, Peter thinks about his childhood ‘home’, tries to remember if there were cobwebs in the high corners. If there were nigh invisible threads attached to his parents and siblings that pulled them away from him. 

(Of course there wasn’t, Peter knew then and he knows now. He just accepts the truth now, no longer searching for excuses for his family.)

When Peter asked about eyes and being watched, Simon raised an eyebrow, looked up, told him to look into the Magnus Institute, that his family had ties to it, and backflipped off the ship. 

(He… didn’t even stay for dinner…)

Peter wishes he’d never asked, wishes he kept sailing and did his best to ignore the persistent gaze on his back. But of course he didn’t do any of that. Instead, Peter Lukas, still young and ignorant, set his course back to England. 

Peter, even now, still wonders how things would’ve been different if he hadn’t arranged a meeting with the head of the Magnus Institute. How much ~~heartbreak~~ trouble it would’ve saved him. 

(He still can’t bring himself to fully regret it.)

Despite how it might seem, Simon always knew what he was doing.


	3. James

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> fuck the beholding   
> \- this post was made by not nerd gang

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't forget about this fic I just couldn't figure out how to write this chapter oop-

James Wright was a fucking asshole, Peter decided that upon their first meeting. Even worse. He was a boring fucking asshole. 

He smiled and asked why Peter was here, if he wanted to review the expenses. Then, when Peter clarified this was not a business meeting, leaned back in his office chair and asked about his day. 

Peter remembers very clearly making the decision to not dignify that with a response, but he spoke anyways. He told Wright about his landing in port this morning, told him about the Eyes that watched him step off the  _ Tundra _ , that sitting here, he feels Seen for the first time. Told him how much he hated it. 

(Bastard didn’t even give a response to that, just smiled and Watched as Peter blanched and left abruptly.)

Their second meeting wasn’t much better, Peter is still on the fence on whether it was actually worse. He was set to attend a ‘get-together,’ a lot of important people are going to be attending, both in the know and not, and appearances are important to keep up. Before, this job had fallen to Peter’s mother, or whichever poor family member she had appointed to attend. This year however, the invitation was delivered to Peter. His mother had become ever more elusive as she aged, so much of the housekeeping fell to Peter during his rare time on land. And as it seemed, one of such responsibilities was, unfortunately, formal get-togethers for the funding for the Magnus Institute. 

(Peter resolved to keep his mouth shut this time, seeing as how he had to shut himself in his cabin for three months before he stopped shaking.)

The first five minutes went fine, great even. They both pretended this was the first time they'd met and that last meeting didn’t happen, Peter even managed to dodge politely out of a handshake before making his excuses to move to the other side of the party. 

Peter doesn’t blame himself for what happened later at that party, for once, it  _ really _ wasn’t his fault. It was James Wright’s. 

He had stepped out to the balcony to have some time alone, whether it was by conscious choice or subtle influence from his master, no one stopped Peter from leaving the party. He breathed in the silence, the tension of having to speak to so many people in one night leaving him in a long sigh. Out here, he could almost imagine being back on his ship, and all the clarity it afforded him. 

Then Peter felt eyes on him from all directions, the hair on the back of his neck standing up as Wright stepped beside him. He made no sign that he was Watching Peter, just smiled cordially and inquired after Peter’s health, because he was  _ concerned _ about his sudden disappearance from the party. Peter felt the draw, the compulsion to speak, to spill forth whatever answer Wright was looking for. 

Peter is at a place now where he can admit perhaps he overreacted. In hindsight, jumping off a second floor balcony and sending everyone in the mansion into a separate dimension was not the best idea he’s ever had. But he did not like the feeling of being another power’s prey, or being Beholden to James Wright. 

(His left leg still sometimes aches from that landing, the Lonely doesn’t grant the same protections as, say, the Hunt.)

In his defense, the party attendees were barely whisked away, not forsaken for long enough that the mundane there cannot attribute their temporary solitude as a trick of the mind. And it’s not like Peter actually had the capability to send any of the more powerful there away, not then anyways. 

He stopped a few streets down, leg aching and lungs burning, he was never an active person. He’s not sure how long he stood there, hands on his knees and trying to catch his breath, but it must’ve been long. Because before he realized it, Wright had strolled up behind him with a grin  _ dripping _ off his face. 

Peter punched him. 

(Nowhere to go but up.) 


	4. Elias (Jonah)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'mmmmm back!!

They keep fucking getting worse. Peter had _just_ gotten used to Wright before he went and kicked it. It had taken almost four years but they were approaching amicable in their relationship, and then Wright had died out of nowhere of some bullshit heart condition. 

Peter wonders if Jonah had known that Peter was getting comfortable with his presence and decided to switch bodies purely to screw with him. He wouldn’t put it past the man.

He visited Wright’s grave, surrounded by the fog and static of silence. He had sat by the headstone, and marvelled at how someone with such a vast presence could be summed up into a few words and dates. He cried for Wright, he’s at a point in his life where he can admit that. 

(In his defence, no one tells Peter anything.)

Peter avoided the institute for as long as he could, he didn’t want to see Wright’s position occupied by some other person, didn’t want to stand in Wright’s office and talk about finances with anyone who wasn’t Wright. He wanted to do so even less after finding out who inherited the spot. He had speculated that Wright must have gone a little mad before his demise.

(He couldn’t avoid the meeting forever though, appearances had to be kept up.)

Peter hated Elias Bouchard, when they first met, when Elias Bouchard was still Elias Bouchard and not ‘Elias’ ‘Bouchard’. The man was loud without being to be heard, letting his gaze trail over everything sloppily. A mask of bravado hiding the fear that poured out from him. 

The new Elias was worse. 

Peter knew exactly what he was when they locked eyes, exactly _who_ he was. He had gritted his teeth and walked right back out. 

He’d gone back though, because he was weak. He had missed Wright’s sharp wit, his cutting remarks, the way he had made Peter feel nauseous with the knowledge of being known. 

The man who had been James Wright, and now is Elias Bouchard had smiled at Peter when he returned to the Institute in a swirling of mist. He had picked up where Peter’s last conversation with Wright had left off, like there hadn’t been several months in between. Like he wasn’t a completely new person.

(Peter supposes he wasn’t really, it’s the same bitch after all.)

Peter left that meeting without asking the question burning in the back of his throat. It would’ve been stupid, ~~Wright~~ Bouchard wouldn’t have answered anyway. 

(He would have, Jonah has always loved bragging about his achievements.) 

Simon Fairchild arrived a few weeks later, falling out of the sky into the waters next to the _Tundra_ as she sailed. Peter lost three good sailors fishing him up. The old man had grinned up at him, and grabbed his hand before he could jerk away. The rush of air and blood pounding in his ears was loud enough to drown out all of Fairchild’s words, but his lips formed the words clearly.

(Thank you, a childhood of communicating with parents only across a large room.)

_Jonah Magnus._ That was his name, the name behind Wright and Bouchard and who knows how many more. The owner of the eyes watching him, even here in free fall. 

Peter set sail for London as soon as he was able to breathe normally again. 

He returns to the Magnus Institute, and meets Jonah Magnus’ eyes. 

They fell back into a new normal, as normal as two people like them could get. Peter shook his unfamiliar hands, and listened to his unfamiliar voice drone on. A small part of Peter screamed at him that this is deeply disturbing, that he shouldn’t have found such comfort that Bouchard’s eyes are familiar even as everything else about him is alien. Peter invited Bouchard to join him on a voyage, because he was a moth to the flame already, and it couldn’t hurt that much to touch the light.


	5. Gertrude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ms robinson im in love with you please call me

Gertrude Robinson and Peter were more similar than either of them cared to admit, except that Gertrude might have felt less remorse than Peter for her victims. 

She was a terrifying woman, even when Peter first met her as a young woman with less battle experience than she did towards the end of her life. Her eyes were as cold and sharp as the Arctic air, and Peter couldn’t help flinching back when she turned that gaze on him. She was all of his stern childhood tutors at once, with an eldritch power to back up her own considerable prowess. 

Two months after Robinson was employed, Peter started taking to appearing directly in Wright’s office, he doesn’t like the way she Sees him. She never even attempted to make conversation, she’d just look, and observe, with a pointed silence Peter would strain to fill if he weren’t so well acquainted with it. 

(Peter tries to not think about why he has stopped minding when Wright Sees him, why it’s different. Damn the bastard.)

When Wright died and a filing clerk suddenly stepped up to be the head of the institute, Robinson caught on faster than Peter did, because of course she did. She showed up at his front door one day, and invited herself in. Peter remembers contemplating whether or not to Send Her Away, her directing a knowing look at him, and him very quickly deciding to hear out what she had to say. 

Most of Robinson’s exploits were told to him second-hand, usually by a certain smug Head of Institute. Always in graphic detail, the people she’s sacrificed to ‘save’ the world, the atrocities committed in the name of a greater good. Honestly, Peter sentenced people to eternities alone, trapped in their worst nightmares, and he’s still pretty sure that he’s not as truly evil as Robinson was. 

(There is something about self righteousness, about knowing you are doing the right thing, that makes people vicious. Maybe that’s why Peter never felt quite _right_ with what he is, no matter how good it makes him feel.)

Sometimes Peter envied Robinson, with her assuredness. He used to ask himself, what it would be like if he believed in a cause and worked towards it, like her or the Lightless Flame. Would it fulfill him? Would it take away the aching deep in his bones, a longing he cannot identify. 

(He knows now, and no, it doesn’t. Peter has long since realized that the aching he feels is his cause and purpose. He is the absence of What Is.)

Years later, when Peter would read the newspaper and find that Robinson had, like she had with so many others, foiled his Ascension. As the hope of transforming the world in his vision dissolved, Peter _felt_. Disappointment, anger, hatred. He felt so viscerally and deeply, he almost picked up the phone to thank Robinson, for the reminder that somewhere hidden, was the human Peter Lukas. 

(It passed. The winds tossed sea that was Peter Lukas calmed back down to something that was simply Lukas. And he can barely remember what those emotions had felt like in the moment.)

It has been a shock when Robinson died, that she _could_ die. Even though he knew the End comes for them all, Peter had always believed so firmly in Robinson’s abilities, that it didn’t seem possible a few mortal pieces of steel could kill her. 

(But she was getting old wasn’t she, and so is he. He can feel it in his joints, in the way he has to pull his coat tighter around him on the sea at night.) 

He found Jonah Magnus polishing his gun in his office. He had looked up at Peter and smiled. He offered him a seat, and Peter sat. He waited for Magnus to talk, but they continued sitting in silence until Peter finally left. A vigil of sorts, for a woman who would have sneered at them for wasting time.


End file.
